LAWSUIT ALLEGING FEDERAL VOTING RIGHTS VIOLATIONS IN KERN COUNTY (tags)
After 11 days of testimony, trial ended this week in a landmark lawsuit filed by MALDEF alleging that Kern County unlawfully denies Latinos the right to elect candidates of their choice, in violation of Section 2 of the federal Voting Rights Act. It was the first federal voting rights case in California in more than a decade.
Obama Voting Rights Act Demagoguery (tags)
Obama
Palestinian Political Prisoners Protest Israeli Oppression (tags)
Israel
Supreme Court Guts Voting Rights Act (tags)
police state
THE ECONOMIC-POLITICAL SITUATION OF THE CORDILLERAS (tags)
A YEAR after the US-Aquino2 regime took power, the miserable situation in the Ilocos-Cordillera region mirrors the dismal state of the nation. From the impoverished tobacco and palay farmers in the Ilocos provinces to the indigenous people plowing hybrid corn fields, vegetable gardens and rice terraces in the Cordillera, the empty promises of the Aquino regime are reflected in the continuing violations and betrayal of the people?s right to land, livelihood and resources. The real boss of the Aquino administration turns out to be not the Filipino people, but US Imperialism as it furiously expands its economic interests as well as large scale corporate mines and geothermal and hydroelectric power projects in Northern Luzon and rams down the nation?s throat its Oplan Bayanihan (OPB), the so-called internal peace and security plan. It is these that exacerbate and continue to heighten the national oppression that reached ethnocidal proportion being suffered by indigenous people of the Cordillera and the Filipino people in general. Indeed, Aquino?s Daang Matuwid turns out to be no different from the substandard Halsema Highway with its erosions and slides, close-open status and serving mainly foreign interests in extracting super profits from the region?s resources. Oplan Bayanihan: Furthering the National Oppression of the Indigenous People Despite it?s deceptive psy-war features, Oplan Bayanihan (OPB) is fast showing up it?s true vicious character compared to its failed predecessor, Oplan Bantay Laya 1 & 2 of the unheralded and despicable US-Arroyo regime. The 5th IDPA and the NOLCOM of the AFP have overzealously applied its age-old imperialist master?s tactics of ?divide and rule? by exploiting indigenous social, economic and political systems in its counter-insurgency operations. They target not only combatants but more so innocent civilians including minors and the elderly. Coining nice sounding contraption to hide the harshness and vileness of Oplan Bayanihan does not succeed in erasing the notoriety of the AFP as armed units of the ruling class. Changing its notorious ?Reengineered Special Operations Teams? to ?Peace and Development Operations Teams?does not do the desired trick. It succeeds though in sowing intrigues and beclouding clear provisions of peace pact pagta where armed units (AFP/PNP and/or NPA) are not covered. Operating troops continue to quarter in schools, day-care centers, barangay halls and clinics, private homes and other public and sacred places contrary to clear provisions of CARHRIHL and Protocols of the Geneva Conventions. In many cases, families are broken up as a result of soldiers? womanizing. Young female students are also vulnerable to abuses especially where detachments are near schools. In one case, the whole tribesmen of a young lass have to be mobilized to demand accountability of the soldier?s tribes mate when a married soldier impregnated a young first year college student. Also drunken soldiers always spark troubles with youngsters even at the flimsiest of reasons.
PHILIPPINES: New Economics for a New Administration (tags)
The dominant feature of the Arroyo administration was pervasive corruption, but its most destructive legacy in the long term will probably be its policy failures. The ascent to power of a new president, backed by a new Congress, provides the opportunity for a fundamental shift in policy in order to end poverty and re-launch the Philippines on the road to development.
On the Ancestral Land MOA of the MILF and GRP and the Escalation of Hostilities (tags)
The Cordillera Peoples' Democratic Front (CPDF) expresses deep concern and condemns the war of aggression being waged by the US-backed reactionary Armed Forces of the Philippines that has caused the evacuation of hundreds of thousands of both Christian and Moro people in Mindanao. It likewise condemns US direct intervention in the war-torn south.
The Ron Paul “Revolution”, an Extreme Rightwing Threat (tags)
"Paul is a white nationalist of the Stormfront type who has always kept his racial views and his views about world Judaism quiet because of his political position." American Nazi Party Commander, Bill White
High-Tech Torture Lawsuit Headed For Appeals Court (tags)
Federal Judge Virginia A. Mathis dismissed Charles A. Schlund's lawsuit against George W. Bush late last year – without a legitimate reason for doing so. Charles Schlund is going to appeal Judge Mathis' decision. Charles Schlund is a whistleblower and political witness who is being subjected to *high-tech* [i.e. electronic] torture by the U.S. government, in order to prevent him from exposing the *massive* corruption of the Bush administration. The information that Charles Schlund has is far more damaging to George W. Bush than anything that Jack Abramoff has, and the government is desperate to prevent Mr. Schlund from getting a fair trial.
Objection!!!: Supreme Court nominee seen as threat to women, labor, racial equality (tags)
WASHINGTON — Hours after President George W. Bush nominated John G. Roberts to the Supreme Court, fighters for human rights bombarded the Senate with demands that they reject him on grounds he is an enemy of women’s equality, labor rights and voting rights. Roberts’ nomination threatens to push the nation’s highest court further to the right for years to come, they said.
40 years after Bloody Sunday, 10,000 march in Selma
Save the Zapata / Zapatismo Mural (tags)
Hector Ponce's Mural Depicting Emiliano Zapata and Chiapas Leader Sub-Commandante Marcos Declared an Illegal Sign and Slated for Destruction by the Department of Building and Safety
COUP WATCH: Real Vote Victims: Minorities (tags)
Juan Gonzales highlights a few of the many cases that show massive voting rights violations throughout the state of Florida that are still being ignored by corporate media and the political process. A brief excerpt from his NY Daily News Column, with link to original.